The Ryen Russillo Podcast - Westbrook-Wall Was Necessary. Plus, Revisiting the 2018 QB Class Scouting Reports With Daniel Jeremiah.

Episode Date: December 4, 2020

Russillo shares his thoughts on the Wizards trading John Wall and a 2023 first-round pick to the Rockets for Russell Westbrook (4:00), before talking with NFL Network’s Daniel Jeremiah about young NFL QBs in “part two” of their career vs. their buzz leading up to draft day, including Baker Mayfield, Sam Darnold, Josh Allen, Lamar Jackson, Deshaun Watson, Patrick Mahomes, Josh Rosen, and more (18:00). Finally, Ryen answers some listener-submitted Life Advice questions (1:00:00). Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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When you want the real deal, like a good neighbor, State Farm is there. The plan for today, Daniel Jeremiah, NFL Network, move the sticks, does a bunch of stuff, and a big draft guy. But instead of just going all in on the 2021 draft, we're going to do something a little different.

We'll do maybe a couple of headliners that he has from that class. We end up doing a ton on the quarterbacks because I think that's what people want, and I know it's probably the most interesting. I don't know. Kyle, would you download a podcast that broke down the top seven guards? I'm not talking about basketball. Then definitely no.

Definitely not. What is your taste of anything? I don't know that I've explored that enough. My taste for my podcast and stuff? Yeah, I don't know. I mean, I'll be honest. Would you listen to me if we didn't know each other? I'm still going to go

with yes since the last time you asked me. Good luck getting me to change that one definitely not i don't believe you i don't believe you and i'm not offended i'm just telling you i like like hardcore history i'm like a history nerd sort of so like that's what i like oh okay yeah that's great because uh teddy's rough riders just invaded cuba and we're on that chapter of volume one we're almost done with volume one over here i've been kind of perusing some other books. Are you going to hold off on your next knowledge dump

until you've finished the Volume 1? The problem is I was going to do that knowledge dump with Rockefeller, and then I'm like, am I going to go back and highlight different turns of his story? And then if I'm really going to do the history dump like I've done in the past, I need to either take notes while I read the book,

but I mean, do I really want to do that? Like the book time at the beach, that's my time. I agree. I would vote book. But I mean, do I really want to do that? Like the book time at the beach? That's my time. I agree. I would vote for Roosevelt over Rockefeller, but it might be just because I'm ignorant. No, I mean, the Rockefeller thing is, is unbelievable. I mean, the guy just basically was, was the most intense businessman. I don't know, ever. Seriously. I mean, his standard oil stuff is off the charts. But you're like, hey, are you guys going to talk about this the whole time? We're not. So, well, maybe we'll do a vote for the next big history dump. I'd like to get Philbin on

to maybe do the Mayflower book because that's probably my favorite book on history that I've ever read, but it was years ago. So then it means I probably have to read it again to do the interview the right way, which I'm not sure I want to do, but I do want to have him on because I've read most of his stuff. So maybe we'll just do that. The Chernow thing, I don't know. He's my white whale. I'm not sure we're ever going to get Chernow because if we did, then what do I do? Do I go, hey, let's cover Hamilton, Grant, Rockefeller, Morgan Stanley, Washington. Do we do that? And then the other book that no one can remember um I don't know I don't know or we just do Washington for an hour that's probably the

best way to go because it's as far as all the books so far Washington was the best one so Daniel Jeremiah will do some life advice but let's start with this it's a trade that had to happen it was the only way it could happen and it was maybe the least surprising but it's still such a big headline John Wall traded for Russell Westbrook. All right. Basically, from a basketball standpoint, I can do 10 minutes on this, but I'll admit my first thing, and not because maybe we were just desensitized by it because we had heard about it a couple weeks ago, and you go, look, if they're really going to move one of these guys, that's pretty much it. This is Rashard Lewis for Gilbert Arenas without the gun suspension. That's what this trade feels like. And at this point, I think Westbrook still has more to offer than any of the guys are talking about. Although some of the defense of Westbrook player is like, hey, he made 13 all NBA. He really shouldn't have. He put together those two great months and the season stopped and he wasn't very good when he came back.

But again, that didn't really matter as a play as a whole thing. So don't know like if you're going hey westbrook's still an awesome player yeah he's gonna put up numbers he's definitely gonna put up numbers with the whiz we'll talk about the east here in a little bit the money the money's actually even believe it or not wall is still owed more in this i don't know what the pick's gonna end up being it's protected i guess there was some stuff where originally it could have happened, and then it had to wait to figure out what was going to happen with this pick. I mean, obviously, a first-rounder has to be involved with anything. The difference is there was one here instead of seven.

Let's start at least with the East. Let's at least do that. All right, so if we look at last year's East standings, who's still in? Milwaukee's still going to be in. Toronto finished with the second-best record. They were actually closer to Milwaukee than they were Boston. So you've got Milwaukee, Toronto, Boston, Pacers. The Miami Heat clearly will still be in.

The Sixers are going to be a playoff team. Brooklyn should be a playoff team again. So that's actually seven teams still there. I tweeted out last night with Westbrook. Does that put them in that 5-7? Did I say 5-7 or 5-8 range? I probably should have said six to eight range because healthy Westbrook, healthy Beal,

and a couple other nice pieces we like, that has to be enough. Westbrook over the course of a regular season. Again, health at this point with him is, it's not a given. It's a better bet than it is Wall, which is probably why Washington just, you know, blink, look at the trade and go, who won it?

Okay, money's even, pick, all right, whatever. We'll see what happens. But Westbrook's a better player in this situation. And Wall is younger, but he's coming off the Achilles injury. We'll get to that in a little second. But Washington should be, they better be a playoff team. They better be, because then you go to go, who else is jumping back in? Charlotte with a healthy Gordon Hayward, best version of Charlotte.

Are they close? They were six games behind Orlando last year. And again, it was an Orlando team that was seven games under 500. Chicago. I don't know. I don't see that. They were 20 games under 500 last year. Maybe. Knicks, no. Pistons, God, no.

Atlanta. Everybody's on Atlanta. They're better. No doubt. They're better. Younger players getting better. The two pieces, probably the two big pieces that we look at them bringing in. And there's still some work to do there because Collins has been the most available guy in the league now for a while. But I don't mean that nobody wants him if he's been that available this long. they were tied basically for the worst record in the East last year with Cleveland. They had one more win and one more loss. So percentage points ahead, barely. But Atlanta and Cleveland were the two worst teams in the East.

And Atlanta was right there with them. So they've got to improve 13 to 15 games. Maybe, not impossible. But that work for Washington is still a little bit more than probably what I'd originally tweeted out this week. Look at the West. Okay, Lakers still in, Clippers still in. I know everybody's so off the Clippers. Here's a bit of a zag.

The Lakers offseason was great. But was it that great? Was it so great that we're just supposed to think everybody's going to roll over now for the Lakers or suggesting there's any challenge for the Lakers? Is that the mistake that some of us ran into on the restart where they look terrible, couldn't make any shots, rotation was still weird. And by the way, whenever you see a team where the rotation is still weird,

never forget the bubble Lakers because the rotation was forever weird. It was never consistent and it didn't matter because they were adapting. And that's why Vogel's really good as a coach. He actually did adapt, but when you lose and you adapt and it means you're a bad coach, those are the rules.

So Clippers in, clearly the Nuggets in, Thunder, see ya, Jazz, Mavs in, Portland's in. So that's seven spots right there.

Again, Lakers, Clippers, Nuggets, Jazz, Mavs, Blazers. Rockets would be seven with healthy Harden. It should be. But think how tough the rest of the West is, okay? Oklahoma City, I think we can write off at this point.

But Golden State, Minnesota, the Pelicans, healthy. That should be a playoff team. Sacramento, they're not terrible. San Antonio, again, not terrible. And then Phoenix, who has to be in the playoffs with Chris Paul. So the bottom of the West, as we've said a couple of times here, it is worth repeating. It is so much deeper than the bottom of the East that it can actually inflate some win totals in the East when we start comparing the top of the East to the top of the West. And that could end up being a bit of a mistake. Now, the biggest problem for Houston is you're going, okay, now what?

I defend Wall sort of. I think it's at least worth remembering that a couple years ago, he was awesome. If you go to 16-17, his efficiency was never better. It was kind of a career run for him. Played 77 games. You could do some of the raw stats. I'm not going to do all that stuff, but he was really good. He was arguably like ninth, tenth in the league, just that alone. Now, does it mean perennial top 10 player? No, that's stretching it a bit, but he was really good. Again, that was two seasons ago. He's played 41 games in 17-18, 32 games 18-19,

and didn't play any last year. That's a tough bet on the Achilles. However, we've seen video from pickup games. So what does that mean? It means everything is fine. Scotty Brooks is just telling us he's never looked better. And apparently Harden loved what he saw because they played in a pickup game together. And Harden was like, yeah, I'm in. Now, just to back up here, and I know Houston, I know what you're going to do here. And look, Houston, I'm your friend. I've been trying to help you through all of these big stories the whole time. I'm trying to make you guys in the local market better. I told you about Bill O'Brien and DeAndre Hopkins. I told you Deshaun Watson didn't really like him that much either.

I actually defended you in the sense where Houston, I go, yeah, they're not the only ones cheating. Maybe they're not. No one else is doing it this egregiously. But other fan bases shouldn't just sit there and go, I can't believe you guys cheated when a lot of your teams were doing some weird stuff, too, but maybe not to that level. And then, as I've told you throughout this entire Rockets thing, like, I don't know why you root for this. It's gross to watch. That's fine. It's your guys.

You stick up for them. Now, I'm not going to sit here and give myself an annoying, condescending W on the Westbrook trade. Because remember, let's go back to one year ago in December, because this started making the rounds. I had said, look, I think Westbrook's available. I made it very specific. It turned into something else. I can only take the full W if Daryl Morey were still there and traded Westbrook, which eventually was going to happen. And if you push back on that, like, yeah, you're right. Daryl never trades anybody. My bad. That's sarcasm. So it's not a full W for me that Westbrook is out of there. It's just this thing is kind of a disaster. And this is unfortunately what you've had to root

for the whole time. And I feel bad. I'm giving you a hug right now. But think about Harden the GM. What's our other rule on this podcast? The players are the worst general managers. Harden went from wanting Paul, getting him, then being like, I don't know about this. I can't even do a Harden impersonation, by the way. Not that I need to or you really want me to. To then wanting Paul out and wanting Westbrook. He's like, here we go.

And then you're like, hmm. And apparently Harden wanted Wall. So they did it. And then, you know, now it's his teammate. Yet Harden still wants out. I don't know what's going to happen with the Harden trade. The player ends up always winning this eventually, and we could sit there and wish it were different.

And I think we're getting dangerously close to just so much movement that you're like, is this good for the league? Although my solution to this all, something I brought up 10 years ago, redraft everybody every single year. It'd be the biggest event in sports, all 450 plus players available every single year.

You just draft and you could go by like city and whoever won it picks 30th the next year. Just do it that way. It may be annoying, but it also may be awesome. And then you could just do contracts, be like four and five year contracts. And then you just, you draft the contract. I could, I could do this whole thing. I do a full podcast on this, maybe a two-parter when we're really, really bored if sports shut down again. I mean, there's other examples of this. I mean, Paul George wanted LeBron, then didn't, then wanted Russ, and then stayed with Russell Westbrook, then wanted with, he wanted to be with Russell Westbrook so bad he left after a year. Then Kawhi wanted Paul George. And now

you get Paul George saying this kind of stuff. And then, you know, the way I was being used, I felt like I was, you know, Doc was trying to play me as like a Ray Allen or like a JJ Redding, like all pin downs, all like, I can do it, but that ain't my game. Like, you know what I mean? I need some flow. I need some mixes of picking rows. I need some post-ups. All that.

Just different touches. You know what I mean? And so it was just, you know, that last season was just hard overall. That was with the, all the smoke crew. When you hear that, do you think leadership? And there's a lot of evidence that he's not made great calls on other stuff. I mean, he's basically complaining about the way he's being used when it wasn't the way he was used.

Because if you go with Kevin O'Connor's tweet, it was like interesting comments from Paul George. He finished 33% of his total plays using the pick and roll, which was a career high. The prior high was 25% in Oklahoma City. So the way Doc used him was the way Paul says he wanted to be used. And then George actually says that's not how he was used. George invented the approach that Doc used with him this year. That's a scary deal. That whole quote from you, and you can hear, you know, Steven Jackson and Matt Barnes going, yep.

And I don't expect them to know his play ratio on the spot like that. But I think that's kind of scary. And I also think that's the kind of guy that doesn't show up in playoff games a lot, which we've been over. And it actually leads to a perfect conclusion. And that is that's why LeBron and Anthony

Davis, who have both re-signed, are the perfect player GM pairing. LeBron, the GM, can be emotional. He wants to know young players. He wants you to trade all of his draft picks. And if you're a Cleveland fan, you're like, yeah, that's right.

He wants us to trade all of our draft picks when he would have no commitment beyond next week. Not the best. But he signed an extension with the Lakers. Anthony Davis signs the extension with the Lakers. Five years. Doesn't do the shorter deal to get to the 10 years of service time where he could hit it again. But some people are now like, well, he did the five years because he did this. So yes, there are those

of us from just all the conversation around. It's like, it's probably going to go to shorter, probably going to go shorter. Okay. Now he wanted to go longer because of this, but then he thinks he can hit it one more time. Got it. All right. And there was a couple of people that had said, oh wait, cause I never thought he was going to leave LeBron. You don't let Clutch run the show out of New Orleans and then go play with Clutch's guy in LeBron and then go, hey, do you want to explore free agency and make it harder in LeBron with the Lakers? That was never going to happen. What I did say is that other teams, and I said this with Simmons, is that other teams were still operating from a, hey, you never know standpoint. We're trying to make sure the relationship with Clutch was great, bringing in some of their draft picks late in the process

when it didn't seem to make any sense. And I would ask, why are you bringing this guy in? And he'd be like, look, you never know. LeBron gets hurt. They don't get along. I mean, all these guys kind of bail on each other all the time, too. I mean, just look at the Harden resume here. But Davis is deferential enough to the orbit that is LeBron's galaxy

that it can work because of an age thing and a separation and the fact that Davis had to lose that many, you know, those many years in New Orleans. So for right now it works and clearly it works well enough for him to do the five-year instead of two. I never thought he was going to leave.

I was saying other teams operated with the hope that anything is possible because things change so fast, which we've just been over because things change so fast in this league. We tease him at the top, Daniel Jeremiah. I love when he stops by. We're not so much into the 2021 draft, but we'll ask maybe a few questions here or there. You know him from the NFL Network, Move the Sticks podcast, also the Amazon kind of scout show that they do because of eight years in NFL front offices. All right, man, let's just jump into it. The idea for today was, I can't believe it's only 2018, that draft, Baker, Darnold, and Josh Allen, Lamar, Josh Rosen.

We don't have a ton of tape on him since that year, but that's only a couple drafts ago. And I felt like the way we categorized this is there's a group of quarterbacks, not all from this class, but are kind of now under part two of their career. We were waiting to see what part two is. So let's start at the top. Remember, the Baker story was kind of crazy last minute. People were like, wait, Schefter's reporting that he's going to go one. But other teams really did like him that year. So it maybe wasn't a total shock to NFL people.

But here we are with Baker. The Browns have a great record, but it is still week to week with him. Let's talk about your evaluation then and where you're at now. Well, first of all, I want to do the behind the scenes story because you referenced there is Baker going to go one or not. So during that process, I had, you know, I had always thought that it was going to be Darnold. I remember at the pro day thinking of Browns at that, you know, they were enamored with him, Darnold in the rain at the pro day, kind of sealed it. That was it.

And then all this stuff about Baker started popping up and it was like, okay, this is a legitimate possibility. And then all of a sudden it was like, okay, this is going to happen. They're taking Baker. And I think for the last, maybe like a couple of days before the draft is when that kind of dropped. It might've been Sheffield that did it, but it was like, okay, they're going to take Baker.

And then. Because people thought it was media wise from the outside. outside, again, this is just people on the outside. For sure. It was so not according to plan because you just expect the reports and all that stuff, and mocks can be really misleading that way. People thought it maybe was a smokescreen the last 24 hours. Yeah, and I did. I put Baker in there in the last mock draft.

Okay, this is it. I've heard it from so many credible sources they're going to take baker well we're in i think it was in dallas that year for the draft and so we had we're getting ready to come on set for nfl network for our coverage and my phone rings and it was somebody that was very involved in that process i think it was an agent who was who was connected to one of those guys or in in some way shape or form it was like it's not i'm telling you it's not baker like at like like very very strong take that like this is you're gonna look bad if you go on there and say

this i'm just warning you it's not gonna be baker he's not gonna be this agent i know you can't go too far but was he connected to one of the other quarterbacks was that why he was doing this i don't know how much you can answer here yeah he was connected to one of the players that was gonna go in the top five okay so you kind of you know, all those guys who are represented by and had a feel for it and talking to different teams and, and, and so I'm sitting there going like, holy crap, like I, we're getting ready to go on the air. And I'm like, you have to have that, that discernment, right? Of like, do I want, I don't, I mean, I'm not a newsbreaker. Like I don't want to, I'm not going with any of this stuff, but I'm like, I got to tell somebody. So I call my brother-in-law and I'm like, dude,

you're not going to believe this. But like, I just was told by somebody pretty credible, like this, I don't think Mayfield's going one, like this is going to be nuts. And so, and I don't know if it was with him with a buddy or what, but I, so I call him the next day, the next morning. And I'm like, dude, got some bad info on that. Sorry about that. But I had to tell somebody, you know, so thanks for picking up the phone. He goes, yeah, it was an expensive phone call. I go, what? He goes, I'm like, don't even tell me. I don't want to know. I feel terrible. He was a huge fan. He's a huge fan of the Washington football team. So I worked some back channel to try and get him some type of an autograph, something or other from his favorite.

Because I felt terrible. I'm like, I would never advise you to do anything stupid like that. I just had to tell somebody this information that I had gotten. Yeah, look, it happened. The big one, I remember, was Johnny Manziel. Because whatever there was, there was this weird media Rams, St. Louis connection. And then the agent part of it were the president of the Rams father is a big time agent in football. And you had a bunch of people kind of hinting at it on the air and then off the air being like,

Rams are going to grab Manziel. So I was telling my buddies from St. Louis, like, this is what I'm hearing. And I remember I was close with somebody that was close with Manziel too. And they're like, oh yeah, like that's what's happening. And it was unbelievable. And granted, you know, you're in the role, your role is different than mine, but we don't have the pressure. That's why I have so much respect for those guys. Like I had a thing very last minute for the NBA draft just a couple of weeks ago where somebody was like, this is going to happen. This is exactly what, no one's going to believe it, but this is exactly what's going to happen. And I was like, all right, all right.

And I never said anything about it. And it didn't even come close. Like the team that had the chance to do the thing that I was told absolutely didn't do it. Yeah. So it wasn't like, oh, that was our plan. We didn't have a chance to know you had a chance to and you didn't do it. So anyway, it happens. All right.

So you ready? Yeah, we'll go to Baker here. So I ended up I'm going back through my notes. I'm just going to pull out some of the highlights here from the reports. So Baker I had as the third quarterback in that draft class, which I'd love to get your take on these ranks. I'm trying to find like the good stuff as well as maybe some of the

red flags that are hidden in some of these kind of reports and see what we learn from it. All right. I'll try my best. I'm not going to read the whole thing, but I'll just give you some highlights here. Unique setup. He's very frenetic. He's consistently accurate despite throwing from a variety of platforms and arm angles. Gets a lot of torque from his lower body.

Scroll down here. Biggest challenge in his evaluation involves the lack of tight window throws he's had to make. It's going to take some time for him to adjust to the lack of space at the next level. We get down to the end. He might lack ideal size, but love his accuracy, playmaking, and toughness. Has the tools to be a quality NFL starter early in his career. I thought he was kind of maxed like he was what he was when he entered the league. Wow, I think that's actually right on point.

I mean, it really does feel like that. I mean, where are you with him now, then? I think he's exactly kind of where I thought he would be. Second contract starter, though? That's really the question. Yeah, he's a low-end second contract starter. So he's a little bit dependent on what's around him. And if you have the right surroundings,

if you surround him with a good offensive line run game defense, you're going to win games with him because he's more than capable in that regard. He's not going to be somebody that's going to elevate everybody else around him. But I think, and they're going to find themselves in a place where they're going to be winning and they're going to say, okay, he's good enough. We can win. You know the old line, right?

We can win with him. We're not winning because of him, but we can win with him. I think he kind of falls into that category. Yeah, look, it's not like Cleveland spared any expense for him. They went all in trying to add as many weapons. I don't know what's real now about the Odell stuff where his numbers are better with him gone. I mean, that's the kind of stuff where I'm like,

is it true or is that a framing of stats where stats can be misleading? I think the scary thing for Baker versus everyone else in that class is he's older than almost all his guys by two years. And I think he's got a year. I'm not going to start looking at birthdates here. Josh Allen was,

I think the second oldest out of that, but Baker's Baker was just older than those guys. So at least I don't know how much that plays in the football evaluation, but I just thought, I thought he was kind of what he was. I thought he was already kind of close to his ceiling when he entered the league, high,

high floor, low ceiling guy. So you're still pays. It sounds like you're pretty much still the same on him. Who did you have one then? He was already kind of close to his ceiling when he entered the league. High floor, low ceiling guy. So you're still – it sounds like you're pretty much still the same on him. Who did you have won then? So I had Darnold won. So now what? Yeah.

Let's go through Darnold and we'll see what we can find here. Just kind of skip through some of this stuff. Long, loopy throwing motion, but it's still quick and explosive. He's adept at changing ball speed and ball flight, has enough velocity, fit balls in tight windows. Once he improves his weight transfer from his back foot to his front foot, he should see an uptick in accuracy and velocity. He's a nifty athlete.

He's capable of escaping and creating down the field. Biggest issue coming out was his propensity to fumble the ball. He'd do a better job keeping both hands on the ball in the pocket, covering up once he takes off. Overall, Darnold has some areas to clean up, but I love his size, competitiveness, and ability to make plays on and off schedule. So when I look at that, he's still the best thing he does is off schedule, which can almost be as a negative, right? You kind of view it as a positive when he's coming out. Look at all these great plays he's making off schedule. Well, is it masking the fact that he's not playing great on schedule?

So that was my first thought. The second thought was some of the mechanical things, just simple weight transfer stuff. He still hangs on his back foot all the time, and that's when a lot of the turnovers, a lot of his interceptions come from him just hanging on his back foot and floating the ball out there. So those were, you know, when you look back at it, you kind of see some of the warning signs there that he's had some issues with.

I'll admit, I liked him better than everybody else in this class. He has the worst QBR of any qualifying quarterback by a lot. He's in the mid-30s. The next worst guys are, you know, I mean, Carson Wentz's story is another podcast altogether but it's you know it's cam it's wentz it's nick mullins foals and lock and mullins foals and lock are not exactly thought of as to be long-term solutions wentz would have won an mvp newton did and then there's darnold way behind everybody else is this fixable? He's 23. So you're talking about Baker's age.

I think he's younger than Burrow. So he's, look, he still has tremendous ability. You see it in spurts. This scheme is awful. I hate the scheme that they're in. I hate the- Why do you hate it? What is it?

Give me something that every one of us can understand. Yeah, I don't think there's baked in winners. If you watch a Rams game, watch a Rams game with McVay calling plays for Jared Goff, he starts the game with 10 completions. So, I mean, I'm just saying like, basically there's 10, 10 completions built into the, into the game plan. Like those are just layups, gimme's and you're off and running. They just don't really have that there. Um, I don't like the way they attack on first down. Like that's a great time to throw the ball, throw the ball early in downs. And I don't like the way they attack on first down. That's a great time to throw the ball, throw the ball early in downs,

and I don't think they do a great job of that. They don't adjust in games. If you watch him play, if you watch the Jets, Darnold's first drive is usually pretty good. They actually move the ball down the field. They'll get some points. They'll stall out, get field goals, but they move the ball. They get worse as the game goes along.

All that's telling me is that when you have a week to prepare, they do fine. When you have to make in-game adjustments, they're terrible at it and they don't put him in good spots. I don't absolve him from the issues he's had, but when you look at the lack of guys around him and just a system that I'm not a big fan of, and look at Tannehill. I think that's a big part of it. Look at him leaving that system and the success he had. I'm still hopeful for Sam. I just, I don't think it's going to happen there with the Jets. Would you be calling to try to get him?

I would. You know, the, gosh, it's hard. And by the way, I bring this up only because I think we're all guilty of this. You know, we put a lot of time into it. You have an opinion of him. It's like, am I trading because i want my opinion to come true like am i still lying to myself three years later or is it and there's plenty of arguments to be made as you just said the jets are so toxic

it's at least worth a shot i mean hell if it's a third or fourth rounder i don't know i don't know why you wouldn't i've been thinking, look, this last week was not good, and that's what gave me pause. I wanted to see how he would play when they had Mims out there with Perriman and Crowder, because it's actually with those three guys healthy, that's not a bad group. Mims is really good. And Sam looked bad.

He just did not play well this last week. So I have been saying, like, I thought he would fetch a late one just because the opinion of him was so high coming out. You know what the raw skill set is. And I honestly thought the Tannehill factor with Tannehill getting away from that Adam Gase offense and going and playing at a completely different level than he ever played at in that offense. I thought teams like, you know, Pittsburgh who could be picking bottom one, who don't really have their future guy on the roster. You look at San Francisco, who's not enamored with Jimmy

Garoppolo. He could be a fit there. Indy doesn't have their future guy on the roster. You look at San Francisco, who's not enamored with Jimmy Garoppolo. He could be a fit there. Indy doesn't have their future guy on the roster. There's good teams that we're going to be picking towards the back of the first round when we're looking at this thing a few weeks back. Now, the Niners pick has climbed a little bit, but I don't think they're going to get a player as talented as Sam. He's 23 years old at that position, so I thought they could fetch a late one, but Ryan, watching last week, if he plays the rest of the season like he did last week, then that's not happening. Yeah, and I probably should have said a mid-round, but I don't know. When I saw the early reports, I was like, you guys can ask for first and a second.

I don't know. Maybe. Maybe. All right. So Josh Allen then. He went seventh and he has, I think right now, I mean, the weird thing is, is Josh Allen, the best quarterback out of this group, and that's including somebody who won an MVP in Lamar, which I know we'll get to here in a second. I think it's a fair, I think it's a fair comment. Let's go through the report here. Ideal size, arm strength, mobility at his best driving the ball outside generates outrageous velocity, can squeeze the ball tight windows windows needs to improve on touch throws though there's some other stuff needs

to throw with more anticipation there are times where he really locks on initial read which can lead to pass breakups turnovers uh while he has room to improve on his overall ball placement a lot of drop balls i mean his supporting class was terrible wyoming uh combination of uh athleticism and strength allows him to avoid free rush or shake off tacklers. Aggressive runner, been very effective design quarterback runs and scrambles. Overall, not a finished product, but offers unlimited upside provided his drafting team exercises patience. So there you go on that one. I think, you know, he's a great example of, there's this theory, right? right of of you evaluate guys against

their best opponents so you start there especially if you're not a power five player we got to the point we're putting so much weight on how they play against their their power five opponents and he was josh allen did not play well against iowa i think he had three picks in that game all right terrible against oregon and at the end of the day, you realize he was playing with nothing. He had nothing around him. His Oregon numbers are so bad. 9-24, 64 yards and a pick. He had a 51 rating.

That's a college football QB rating system that goes a lot higher than the NFL one does. I always look at that Iowa game as a positive. He got his ass handed to him and he ran around and competed and still made some of those guys look bad as they were chasing them all day long and making like they, they destroyed the offense. They bottled up whatever they were trying to do. I came away from that game,

actually liking him. The Oregon game was so bad. It was hard to see a guy complete nine passes for 50. It like yeah i'm in like top five pick uh because the accuracy the accuracy thing always kind of scares you a little bit and look his first two years it looked like he might be looking for a job in four i really think that i know bill's fans seem to disagree but he's the real deal i mean whatever he is he's probably not as good as he was that first month but i've seen enough through the rest of the season to go it seems like they have their guy and he's going to get the big contract and hopefully it works out. And he's there 10 plus years. The thing about that

Iowa game, he had a deep ball in that game that was dropped. It was incredible, incredible throw in that game. There was a couple of throws that were dropped in there, but I just remember one deep, I want to say it was a deep post. He's on the move, scramble, just puts it on the money. It was right through the guy's hands. It like towards the back of the end zone. But he was, yeah, I remember watching that tape, but he's interesting to me because, and you go back through some of these other drafts and you go back to 2017. So with Josh Allen and Mahomes, you had guys that were raw and Mahomes played a lot more football and a lot more throws there at Texas tech, but you had insane amount of ability.

And the other thing is when you met with those guys and I got a chance to visit with them, but then talking to teams who really dug in with those guys, like off the charts, intelligent, like football intelligence was, was phenomenal. So you had the raw talent and you had the intelligence and, you know, all the work ethic, all that stuff was there. So I think that, you you know they've uh they've been able to see that talent kind of come through well we talked about the mvp winner out of this group lamar and now that we've got another season of it give me your breakdown ahead of time and then then where we're at because it's really it's

almost like two different questions where we were at and i think where we're at now for the year this is an interesting one because I think when I go back through and read this, the people are, there's nobody on the fence on Lamar, right? Everybody loves him or they seem to not believe in him. And I think you can pull out from this report whatever side you're on and try and reinforce what you believe. But this is coming in the draft. Most dynamic playmaker in college football the last two years.

Quick feet in his setup. Bounces on his toes once he gets to the top. Throws from a very narrow base. Generates tremendous velocity just flipping the ball, failing to generate any power or torque from his lower half. More accurate, consistent on in-breaking routes and over-the-top touch throws. His accuracy really suffers when he has to drive the ball outside the numbers. Too stiff on his front leg, the ball sails on him.

Most electric runner at the position to enter the NFL in the last decade. Designed quarterback runs. Very elusive. Overall, Jackson needs time to work out some mechanical issues, but his playmaking ability is very special. The same issues he's having outside the numbers and down the field, he's got the same issues now that he did at Louisville. They've designed an offense around him with the ability to run the ball and to be able to go with the RPO games. It's just slants and seams.

He wears people out on slants and seams. He's won the MVP on slants and seams, but he still struggles to make some of those other throws down the field and on the perimeter. He just doesn't have that accuracy. You and I were talking about this back then because, I mean, obviously I defer to you, but I knew how much I watched him because on Saturdays I'd always have a Lamar TV on.

I was just like, this is awesome. But also I knew I probably, for all the people who were arguing about it, and it became a few of us, I know I can be guilty, all of us sometimes, the straw man thing, but I don't invent it out of nowhere, but the should-be receiver was Polian and it was Booger McFarlane. It was like two people. It was like two people and they made hoodies about it. And I think that becomes part of the Lamar discussion, which is like, okay, we're even just talking about him as a football

player. I don't know if you're going to agree or disagree. I think he's more consistent now as a thrower than he was at Louisville. I do think he's actually improved, which is still kind of scary because it's somewhat of a regression or I think at least people figuring him out a little bit more and understanding that there's just certain things we can do against him. We can sell out in certain moments and other times you try to sell out against him,

he's going to burn you like no other quarterback in the league, except for maybe Kyler. Yeah, no, it's funny. I remember going into the combine after those comments had come out. And so I had went on, I think it was Total Access or one of our shows

and I'd been asked about it. And I kind of just looked into the camera and I said, like, look, if Lamar's listening or watching, when you get to the combine and you go into an interview room and they ask you about playing receiver, you need to stand up,

shake their hands in the room and say, thank you guys very much. I look forward to playing against you and just leave like that. This you're a quarterback. You're absolutely a quarterback. Don't even entertain the court. Don't even answer the question if they ask you that just get up and leave. Because I thought it was, it was insulting based off what he had been able to accomplish. But no,

I think, I think you've seen some improvement there, Ryan. I think his, his overall improvement is not even really with his, you know, with, with his accuracy, because I think the things he's excelling on are the same things he excelled on at Louisville. I think his vision's much better, and that comes with what you're saying. You want to attack him and blitz him, he's able to see the picture a little bit clearer now

than he did at Louisville to make you pay for some of those things. I actually wanted to do the Deshaun Watson thing because what he is, what he is doing for percentage of offense for Houston now is, is nuts. And you know,

like Houston's whole season has been a mess. They had a really, really tough schedule there at the beginning. So I still feel like when you look at Houston because Watson really, and I think some of that defensive stuff is improving. And it's just tough to take Hopkins away for any offense, but to see what Watson continues to do. I know it's one of my pet pee away for any offense. But to see what Watson continues to do, I know it's one of my pet peeves is you don't want to see them in the playoffs. It's like,

well, if they're a playoff team, they're probably pretty good unless it's the NFC East this year. But Houston can put it on you. They can really play with anybody. And it really comes down to how amazing he has been now in the second half of the season. No doubt. Can I guess one of the negatives? Yeah, go ahead. He would just miss on some throws that you didn't expect him to miss on, which I don't know if that's looking for it and then going, oh, yeah, he misses on some throws

when other guys miss on throws. Another one of the things I don't like is when they'll say, oh, that defensive lineman takes some plays off. They all take plays off. They all take plays off. They all take plays off. It's about maintaining their own endurance. But it felt like with Deshaun, for a guy that was that good,

there would just be misses. You're like, how the hell did that happen? All right. I'm going to go through and read it. I'll read this one start to finish. Average height, lean, muscular build. Operates in the gun. Love his poise, playmaking, and intangibles. Holds the ball by his ear. Has smooth, quick delivery. Has enough arm strength.. Operates in the gun. Love his poise playmaking and intangibles.

Holds the ball by his ear. Has smooth, quick delivery. Has enough arm strength he can make all the throws. Accuracy has been very inconsistent, especially on the deep ball. He has some bad misses on tape. Does show the ability to quickly work through progressions, stay poised in the pocket. Decision-making has been another area that needs to improve.

Struggled with red zone picks in his final year. Very effective runner. Slithery runner to avoid tacklers. Has shown toughness both as a runner and in the pocket. Overall, I think Watson has a lot of upside at the position, but his accuracy issues and decision making are a little bit of a concern. Yeah, that was the red zone thing there too. I also think it's because we expected so much out of him.

Oh, yeah. Based off the first Alabama game. Yeah, that was it. I was at that one, too. I remember just leaving that game and like, holy, that's different. That's different, man. So we didn't really prep for this, but who's the most right you've been about as far as quarterback of the modern guys?

And whatever timeline you want to use to make a better case or make the segment better. That's a good question, man. You know what? When I'm going through here, I wouldn't even say necessarily right, but I'll say like the Haskins, there was talk with Haskins. Haskins should have been the first quarterback in that draft class. There's some people that went hard on that. There's some people that thought Haskins should have been the first quarterback in that draft class. There's some people that went hard on that. There's some people that thought Haskins should have been a top five pick. But I kind of went back and pulled these two up because if you look at the guys of this group of guys, I think the jury, the verdict's still out on some of them. Some of them we can say absolutely are hits.

But when I look at the guys, we would say right now, really, really trending in the wrong direction. I'm going to put Darnold to the side because I think he's going to get another opportunity and we'll see what happens with him but if you look at rosen and you look at haskins and you go back through all right uh rosen best pure passer in the draft uh haskins um where is it here uh pure pocket passer right so then it goes through uh Rosen's report. Issues arise when he's under duress, struggles to create on his own as accuracy suffers when he's forced off his original launch point. So then I go to Haskins. Biggest issues arise when he's forced

to move off his spot because he lacks the suddenness to create and get out of trouble. So to me, you're always evolving and trying to learn and grow, and you're trying to learn from previous reports. So I did not go in on Haskins because of Rosen's struggles. Like, that to me was the sign of where we were headed, which was the pure pocket quarterbacks, the guys that can't create, the guys that can't make things happen and play off schedule and off script. You don't really have a shot in this league anymore, man. Like, it's just the way it is. The old guys can,

because they have the years built up of knowledge to be able to beat got teams with their mind. When you look at, you know, rivers and Brady and breeze and these guys, but you have to accumulate all those years. You can't, the offensive line plays so bad in this league. When you're going to get thrown out in the field, you're going to have to initially be able to win with some of your athleticism until you get the experience to start beating teams with your mind down the line.

So to me, it was Rosen's signal, the death of the pocket passer in Haskins. That's what kept me from jumping in on Haskins. Who have you been the most wrong about then? Oh, easy, Mahomes. Yeah. But I say that in that I still feel I saw what I saw with him, which is, and I can pull up some of my notes from my homes,

which was, uh, yeah, make some Matt Stafford throws. He lives off platform. He's both exciting and reckless. Uh, he's got huge arm,

but decision-making is a concern. And then I did put at the end, we met with him the week, uh, the week before the draft, all my stuff was in all my grades ran. Did you tell him to play receiver? Huh? No, I didn't go that far. Uh, no, I, I, I mean, I, I liked him. I just didn't have him up there like that. I mean, I did, I did not think he would go that high. Cause I thought there was some work to

be done, uh, with him. It was a very boot, like the grade, the grading skill that we use. It's like the boo, he's the ultimate boomer bust. Like bust like he's gonna hit big but there's a lot of risk there um but he came in the week before the draft and we we started showing him plays and i would i would be like hey in a tcu game you know red zone third and seven you know blah blah blah with no video and he was just boom this is what the play call was here's what i saw here's the decision that I made. And I'm like, okay, this guy's like brilliant on top of having all this ability. And so long story short, yeah, that's a big mess. I don't know if you and I talked about it.

Clark was big on it because he's so close with Veach. He's done some really good pieces on the decision that went into. Probably the quickest I've been okay with somebody saying, yeah, he's going to be the best that's ever played yeah like in his second year yeah i just normally like my rule would be i'm just not gonna like no because you're gonna be wrong like you can't say that kind of stuff two years in about a guy and with him you go yeah he's probably he's probably gonna be the best quarterback that's ever played the position yeah he may not get six rings but and no one's gonna be better than him if he keeps playing like this, but that they were so bad at tech on defense that that's, that was all part of his calculation

because there were so many throws. And I just wonder how many people are listening to this right now going, ah, like, did you watch all those tech games? I doubt it. Like, I just, I don't, and I'm not trying to be a jerk about it, but I would wonder what percentage of this audience watch Texas tech regularly. And I remember one game Herbstreet did, and he was just admonishing the Pac,

like the Big 12 in a way that was almost uncomfortable from an announcer. It was kind of like Jay Billis on any college basketball game, and yet it was Herbstreet doing it in a college football game. So I just disgusted with the product. And I'm like, you know, and Mahomes would drop back, run around like Tecmo Bowl, throw it up in the air and see what happened. And just go, what the hell is this? The crazy thing is, though, did you see like Tyreek Hill's comments the other day about him?

I was convinced Tyreek Hill thought Mahomes is like Brody Croyle or something. Yeah. I don't understand what Tyreek Hill. I think Tyreek Hill's fast. I'm going to leave it at that. Yeah. No, I understand that. something yeah i don't i don't i don't understand what tyree kill i think tyree kills fast i'm gonna leave it at that yeah no i i understand that but i just from talking to other people there at that time when he first got there like taking a drop like just simple like he was not oh no kidding it was not pretty no so andy and they did a great job of kind of really kind of molding that clay that they had there with that ability and i I think that year was huge from his development standpoint.

But I did hear, I just thought it was funny because I remember hearing some of those stories like that first week where it was like, oh my gosh, like we knew this guy was a little raw, but like, this is crazy raw. And then by the middle of the season, Veach is texting me videos from practice. Like, dude, check this throw out. I'm like, okay, yeah, this guy's going to be pretty good. Veach should be in Canton right now. Just off that one?

Just deciding, because, you know, Cannell and I used to argue all the time about rest versus playing. And I go, eventually you don't get better at something unless you start doing it. You can't, resting is the wrong word, but just not playing. I feel like Mahomes would have figured it out at some point. I don't believe in this alternative path where Mahomes is rushed right away. How could you be the best to ever play but then somehow be a bust somewhere else? But it seems like you're pushing back on this a little bit.

If he's with Gase right now. Oh, gosh. I think his ability would have eventually shown through. That's what I think. He would have been really good. Do I think there was a better situation than the one he went into? No. I think it was absolutely the best. But so then the only way I would push back on that is I would say- Are you pushing back on yourself now? Yeah, I am pushing back on how good the situation is there. I don't push back on his ability and his talent level.

I think that would have come through wherever he went. But what I would say is, if you look at the success that he's had there, and I would push back and say, if you put Matthew Stafford in that offense with Andy Reid and let him roll with it, that we'd be talking about him winning multiple MVPs. If you took Kyler Murray or Russell Wilson or a lot of these other guys and put him in there in this offense, they would win multiple MVPs. If you took Kyler Murray or Russell Wilson or a lot of these other guys and put him in there in this offense, they would win multiple MVPs.

I enjoyed the end of that Tampa game where they threw the screen to the right side and then third and seven, they threw it again, which was maybe going to give Tampa 40 more seconds, I think. Yeah. I think it was 115 when they snapped at third and seven and they threw. And I'm just looking at Andy Reid there

and I'm going, this is the guy that everybody thought was at one point the dumbest clock management head coach in the nfl and he's doing something that on paper is dumb but i loved it i loved it in the moment you're like if this guy's actually the best to ever have done it let him do it let him throw let him end the game right now in third and seven instead of what running run the fight i mean that was a lot of time that was a lot of time to give Tampa in that situation. Did you see, I don't know if you noticed this, but I was cracking up laughing. It was the Raiders

Chiefs game where they came back and won on the last drive. The Raiders go down and score with however much time is left. There was a point in the last couple minutes of that game while the Raiders are driving and Andy was going to start burning his timeouts. He goes, he tries to get the timeout and then like another 10 to 12 seconds, like run

off the clock. And so I'm like, he's going to lose his mind, like on this official, because it just cost him 12 seconds. And they're literally Raiders right on the doorstep, getting ready to score. And he goes down there and kind of like gestures to the thing, like the time. And, and the guy just says like a couple of words to him and just turn around and walked away i'm like he doesn't care he's like 10 or 12 seconds like my guys my guy's gonna have plenty of time to go down here and win this game like any other coach would have lost their mind and andy was just like all right whatever

10 less seconds we'll be okay what i love about the raiders is that second game was terrific they put it on them in the first one the raiders have probably probably the best. Well, they do. They have the best win. If we were going to do college football resumes for NFL teams, the Raiders have the best win and easily the most inexplicable loss. The Saints too, right? Yeah.

But to lose to Atlanta and just get trucked by him, that'll be one of those things. The Raiders, if they're in the playoffs, you're going, oh, wait, that happened? So I wanted to ask you, I want story time from you before we let you go but this has become a big part of the season the the quarterback lawyers

out there so it became a topic that i talked about on monday because of the romo defending brady and basically criticizing arians but it seems like a lot of the ex-athletes hate the law offices of Romo and Collinsworth and all of these guys that seem to protect the quarterback. But then it was another level for the Monday night game with Wentz where people were so mad. Anytime Brian Greasy would be like, well, that actually was a screen

and they missed the block here. And it was on again. And look, it's a lot of guys that used to work with at ESPN like I could start naming names they know who they are they got so mad about the the defense of any of these quarterbacks what do you think is is fair when it comes to the stuff you're at home yeah I mean you're at home just like the rest of us are watching these games they give me a breakdown of the Tampa thing and then Wentz. Yeah, I mean, I don't think either quarterback's in a good situation right now when you look at those two guys. But I also think there's some – I mean, to absolve either one of them of blame

is crazy to me. Neither one of them are playing well. So that, to me, it's kind of a little bit more nuanced there. I don't think either one of them are in the right system that fits what they do right now. And the other side of it as well that but that's where you find yourself your job is to then execute with the situation you find yourself in i think carson's is a little carson's is is is a longer story uh about everything that's going on there with him to me he looks like somebody who's kind of

just completely lost his confidence you know you can see it when a guy and out in hoops i'd be curious around like in football we talk about guys just start guiding the ball right they don't they Completely lost his confidence. You know, you can see it. When a guy, in hoops, I'd be curious, Ryan, like in football, we talk about guys just start guiding the ball, right? They don't have any confidence or trust, and you're really trying to guide the ball in, and then you end up with some really bad misses. I don't know if a shooter goes through a slump,

what that looks like, but that's what it looks like with Carson. There's nothing like a quarterback who's lost confidence. I think eventually, like, if you're a decent shooter, you're not just going to not be able to shoot for a year because you're bummed out i mean paul george playing the bubble so whatever um but i don't know what the excuse was in other playoff games i think the biggest thing that you'll notice in basketball is a guy who was a guy and it's coming back from

some kind of injury and he's good to go it's not like he doesn't trust his knee and you played a lot of basketball he's just stuff around the rim he's in between decisions he doesn't know if he's supposed to sometimes you just forget to drive because you're like you know remember you used to drive past guys but then eventually all that stuff goes away i don't think there's anything as long lasting in basketball as there is as the quarterback who's just completely lost and then you'll see guys who lose so much confidence they just start changing the way they've played like that's one of the crazy things about the cousin story is that cousins was somebody who took no chances to kind of make his way into the game and then he had some decent statistical seasons and then he actually started i think chucking the ball a lot last year and

you're like you know what he actually kind of came around and then you know he has this dud game after they beat the saints which wasn't surprising to me and then the beginning of this year he was chucking it all over the place and they were terrible for it and then they completely like changed who they became as a team with cook and that yet cousins was great like cousins will have these moments where he's like two completely different guys which is one of my biggest problems with ever putting him up in in a higher group with with some other people that have him up there. But Cousins, to me, in some areas, there's some similarities to Rivers in that I always felt like with Rivers,

man, if he hits that hot stretch for him when you get in the postseason, like Flacco is a great example. Flacco over 16, 17 games in any season in his career, you're not going to buy that as a championship quarterback. But he always had that ceiling where for, man, if he can get it for three or four weeks, he's capable of doing that, and off they go.

I've always kind of put Rivers in that category that if he could get in the tournament and just kind of have one of those hot streaks, he could carry him. And Cousins is kind of like the next version of that where, man, I don't trust Kirk over 16 games, but in a three- or four-game stretch, if you've got the good version of Kirk Cousins,

that's dangerous. He could actually do something. I've got the good version of Kirk Cousins, that's dangerous. He could actually do something. I've always liked Rivers way more than Cousins. I wouldn't say this version of Rivers. He's more accomplished. He's definitely more accomplished. Definitely more accomplished, but I'm just still saying that Rivers,

his hot stretches lasted longer than any of Kirk's hot stretches. But I've seen Rivers put together three unbelievable games, and then just out of nowhere, you're like, dude, what happened? Just a clunker can happen. So that, to me, is where I find a little bit of the similarity there. You always have great stories for us from the front office stuff from all your years doing it.

I'll let you just take this one any direction you want to go. So go ahead. All right. So I think I've given you all my good ones. So I can give you ones of guys I've worked with. These are some of my favorites, but I'll give you two of them here. So Duke has their pro day. Or sorry, no, it's an individual workout. So my buddy's going there and he's going there to work out a player. Well, it's pouring rain. So, and it's like a, it's called like a box workout. So it's like, there's little touch pads and you get all

this information on them, change of direction type drills. You can't do it on a, on a cruddy surface. So it's like, all right, we'll just go into it. We'll go into Camden. We'll go inside and do it on the basketball court. So they just kind of work their way in there. Well, you got to put tape on the floor in order to go to have the different things to touch so he's putting him to the workout while the janitor sees him them out there and just loses his mind like what are you doing like kicks him out of there he's got to take the tape off the floor my buddy's like i'm taking the tape off the floor and like some of the paint off of the court it it comes off with the tape. And he's like, man,

we just going to get the heck out of here. So, so he gets out of, he goes, I'm watching a Duke basketball game the next week. And you can still see on the floor, like where, where he's peeled the paint off of the Duke basketball court. So that was, uh, that was one of my favorites. So that was right there in Cameron. Yeah. Sorry, Cameron, Cameron. Yeah. Yeah. Cameron. I mean, what was he putting down?

Duct tape here? Yeah. I don't think apparently it wasn't painter's tape. Apparently it was something a little stronger than that. But yeah, he just peeled the paint right off when he picked it up. So that's my first. My second one. But he's going to Penn State to do a private workout with a player many, many years ago, 15 years ago, wherever long it was.

So he's out there and Joe Pa comes out to talk to him while he's out there working out the player. It's just him and the player out there putting him through the workout. My buddy works for the Ravens, right? Joe Pa thinks it's the Raiders. He just sees his shirt. And so he just starts peppering him with stories about Al Davis and make sure you tell this guy I said hello, all these Italian names of people that are somehow connected with the Raiders. And he's like, I didn't have it in my heart to tell him.

So I just rolled with it the whole rest of the day. And just I was a Raider scout that day as far as he knew. When I did a live show from Chapel Hill for Duke UNC, so I was at the ceiling is the roof Michael Jordan speech game, which some people want to be at the Elo shot game.

Some people want to be the Phoenix Suns finals. I was lucky enough to get his halftime speech, but I drove over to Cameron. I wanted to check out Duke's campus, so I had a few hours. I was like, all right, I'm here. Let me head over there. I was walking around Duke. It's so

different from you. It's not that they're supposed to be identical because they're so close, but it's just, it's very different. The architecture, it's almost like Gothic in a way. So I go over to the gym and I'm thinking, all right, there's probably a way I can get in here. And then a bunch of the players at this point, you're gonna remember I'm like 20 years old these guys like hey it was such i felt like such a loser i'm like hi my name is ryan espn i probably was like within three sentences like van pelt remember remember him and the kids are just looking at me i think one of the kids was foreign too was like uh i was like is there any way i can come in and just look at like i don't want anything i don't want to play i'm not trying to touch with anything i just want to walk in and see the inside of the arena. And, uh, they sent somebody back out and

the guy was like, no, like, yeah, but I'm with the SBA. He's like, yeah, absolutely not. And I was like, okay. Yep. All right, cool. Thank you. Thank you for the hospitality. I appreciate it. I think it's the only time that's the only other time I ever gotten kicked out of anything was, uh, the first ever game at the new cowboy stadium but it was byu in oklahoma it's where bradford hurt his shoulder so the real first game wasn't a cowboy's game it was that football game and we had sideline passes and they still kicked us out was unbelievable so yeah i i went there for daniel jones pro day and i'd been there uh on some football trips before but i that time i was like you know what i'm here we had some We had some downtime. I'm like, I'm definitely going to go.

I want to see that. I want to see Cameron and door. So I went over there. The door was literally just open. I just walked right in. That's the thing is a lot of times it's just that right down onto the floor. Yeah. I didn't, I mean, I just took a couple of pictures and then, uh, and then got out of there. I did not. I should, I should have brought my own ball, but it was a man. It was tiny. Like I, I knew it wasn't, it wasn't big, big, but I got in out of

this thing is a little band box in here yeah hey that's daniel jeremiah move the sticks it's at move the sticks on twitter check out all of his stuff and we'll uh we'll be talking 2021 at some point here soon all right we'll get there good to see you bud you want details bye i drive a ferrari 355 cabriolet what's up i have a ridiculous house in the south fork i have every toy you can possibly imagine and best of all kids i am liquid so now you know what's possible let me tell you what's required life advice rr at gmail.com we'll do a couple quick ones here okay hey ryan have you thought about popping a gummy before the pod and or life advice portion and doing it high well the answer is no to that one um he said maybe a holiday special life advice

with chris long and stone ryan that's not my deal. I don't even really like it being hung over anymore. So I'm not 100% sure. I don't know what that would be like. I'm not a big weed guy, Kyle, as you know. I didn't know that, actually. This is great news. Oh, you thought I was a weed guy? No, I didn't think you were,

but it's just one of those things, like don't ask, don't tell. Is that the right way to use that? I don't even know. I think everybody's into weed now, at well it sounds like almost everybody sounds like almost everybody yeah not everybody look i'm not against it you like weed go ahead like weed i don't care as i get older i judge less and less but yeah i don't i don't feel like doing a hey everyone maybe sort of corporation over here trying to run yeah well i didn't think that would be the thing

but like uh i don't know like the the last couple college games are stuck in on a Saturday maybe just open the stash I don't know I'll tell you the Saturdays haven't been great for college football but I don't know what kind of note taking you'd be going through I know everybody like again when I say everybody

I mean the movement of of everybody being pro weed but as I've said a couple of times, I've been around some people that were super into gummies and I'd be like, this can't be safe. Like this can't be normal that you can just go ahead and get yourself a couple of these. But again,

you can say the same stuff about booze. So yeah, right. So it's not tool concert. I don't want to. I don't want to. Yeah. I'm not sitting around pining about,

Oh, like I could go to a tool concert with a pellegrino and be fired up okay so uh that's i can't wait to see them again i can't wait it's the best all right so sorry about that but uh i appreciate the question oh there's more all right anyway 25 years old and sales a startup that is growing quickly. I might break six figures this year if things play out. Nice dude. Like other males my age that were fortunate to keep our jobs during the pandemic, I also got in the stock market and investing with all this free time during, I don't know what the hell, what he's saying there.

All right. Let's face it. It's easier to get away with working less. Oh, working from home. Working less, especially in sales of the product that typically sells itself and you what he's saying there. All right. Let's face it. It's easier to get away with working less. Oh, working from home, working less, especially in sales of the product that typically sells itself. And you're just in the way. All right. Like that perspective, smart, young. All right. Hey, it's not you like younger guys, like older people. This isn't even an old young, but a lot of people that want to kind of just take credit for stuff because it makes it

feel better. It's more interesting to say you're awesome than say, Hey, I'm actually pretty useless. Although if you're really self-deprecating and so humble, that's actually maybe more annoying than being arrogant. Again, a different topic another day. All right. So I like where this guy's head's at with this. He goes, I went through the typical evolution of a new investor. I already know where this is going, where you think you get rich on a penny stocks and to buying airlines because the pandemic is trying to time the pump and dumps. That being said, I now look to invest and not trade as often. I also managed to take the obsession and emotion out of it after six months. If you were able to do that after six months, congrats to you. I was not able to take all of the emotion out of it.

But then eventually I did. Eventually I did, but it took me longer than six months. And he wants to think towards the future. I'm over 90% return in nine months with a positive outlook. All right. This is the other thing you think about investing. If anybody would ever say like, hey, you're going to have 90% returns on this, what are you waiting for? Cash out now? I don't know. Look, I already thought we were going to be heading into the other direction at some point, not because of an election or anything like that. It had more to do with, I just don't know how this bill isn't going to come due at some point, especially with more shutdowns and probably another stimulus, uh, the start of next year. But again, I'm reading a lot of stuff that you were reading. So I'm not pretending to have any

more insight than a guy that reads. So that's why I'm probably less confident about so many things than maybe the NBA. Uh, and that's why I just, you know, when people yell at me about what they know, I'm like, are you sure? And then it turns into like, as if I'm yelling at everybody else, but I'm just, you know, there's going to be a lot of topics where I'm sort of like, I don't know. I don't know. So anyway, on the stock market, if you have 90% return right now, we're over 30,000 on the Dow, which again, it's not every stock. We understand this, but you're not going to have 90% returns staying in it the entire time. So why don't you get out for a little bit and then see where we're at in a little while?

Honestly, I mean, if you're doing that well already, you're probably not going to keep that pace up. Are you hoping for 200% returns? Anyway, all right. Working at a tech company, I read a lot of the news on other companies, so I'm relatively informed. I like talking about business, what stocks are doing and things like that. My roommate is into it as well, but talks about it not as much as me. Do people find this shit interesting like I do, or is this a quiet hobby, even on a conversational level? He also wants to let us know that he's stoned while he wrote that. All right. I think we all feel stoned up. Now, honestly, this is pretty

straightforward. Why would you care if it makes you look bad? Is it douchey to like investing? No. Why? If you're younger and not as many people in your circle are talking, then just don't talk about it with them. You know what I like about this email is that you actually seem to have a lot of self-perspective on this because, or self-awareness, however you want to phrase it. You are into this. You think it's fun it sounds like you get your ass kicked a few times which is what happens to all of us in the beginning because

you're super arrogant you know what's funny about age is i remember once like talking to bob ryan about a basketball thing when i was in my 20s i mean it's freaking bob ryan i'm at the garden and i say something to him and i go well you know this guy is so much better than this guy and this is what's going to happen. I don't remember exactly what the sports commentary that I was, I was throwing at him, but I was like, you know, Hey, it's Bob Ryan, but he'd been always awesome. Awesome to me still is awesome to me. And I was going to just share my opinion on something with him. And he kind of looked at me and went, well, maybe, and I didn't get it. I'm like, how is Bob Ryan just sort of

indifferent? He's like, I'm not sure what's going to happen. I'm like, how do you not like, what do you mean? You're not sure. How are you not saying you're wrong or you're absolutely right. And his whole point was that he's been around so long that he became more indifferent to thinking, or let me, let me put it differently. He's been around so long that he actually is less certain about the outcome of things. And that's already happened to you at a young age, which is why I'm kind of impressed with this email. So first of all, liking to have your money work for you at a young age is not a bad thing.

Like, don't be freaked out by what I would say the last couple of years, this momentum of where people that are successful suck. Because that whole department is a joke. There's people that hate success, but the first person to like some stupid Instagram fucking post that's like, if it's not making you money, why are you doing it? Or the dumb meme where it's like rich guy poor guy and it's like expensive watch rich guy has a cheap watch you know what rich guys have not cheap watches okay so don't apologize for any of this be interested in it read the room which i think you're actually capable of doing and you know i have some the 90 thing scares me a little bit. He's like, Hey, I'm over 90% in nine

months with a positive outlook. Dude, read about Tesla. And I don't say this because I understand what Tesla is going to do, but read how determined the bears are on Tesla to continue to tell you why the stock is worth nothing after it split, like it did. And after it split, and then it wasn't on the S and P and that people like, see, I told you, which didn't make any sense why it wouldn't be on the S and P. So it dips, and everybody who loves it still bought the dip because they're like, the S&P thing doesn't even mean anything. And then guess what? They got listed. And then it took off again. And I'm not telling you it's going to keep taking off. What I'm telling you is that it's just like sports with Tesla, is that all the people

that saw, let's say, Tesla as the quarterback out of college and thought he was going to suck, they keep telling you the company sucks all the time, and they don't know. And then the people that saw, let's say, Tesla as the quarterback out of college and thought he was going to suck, they keep telling you the company sucks all the time, and they don't know. Then the people that look at Tesla as the next Andrew Luck have been right so far, but they don't know the next 10 years. They can tell you they think you know. They're all just rooting for the same outcome, except this part of it, instead of a football player, it's their wallet. So yeah, keep reading, but the longer you're gonna be around the longer you're gonna be bob ryan it's like hey i put some money into this i don't know what's gonna happen sounds like it's like fantasy football like you talk about legalized gambling i mean basically

yeah but just as far as like talking about it like some people really don't want to hear anything about your fantasy team and other people are like oh dude i got crushed too what you don't want to hear anything about your fantasy team. And other people are like, oh, dude, I got crushed too. What you don't want to be is gambling guy who's never lost a fucking bet. All right. Or gambling guy that has like a 13 teamer in Vegas. And then shockingly, when it doesn't go his way, he's like, I can't believe I just lost 21 grand. You're like, no, you didn't lose 21 grand. You lost what you bet and the opportunity to win 21 grand, which wasn't going to happen

because you weren't going to hit on a 13 teamer. All right. Investment guy early on, but a lot of us go through this. We'll go through this and I did it too. You're so insecure in your twenties that you kind of want to stand out and like a couple of your friends are killing it and you're maybe not. And maybe your friend who you think is killing it actually isn't. And then everybody's kind of overcompensating. And maybe you're just a completely well-adjusted guy in the middle of nowhere who's already got his high school sweetheart and you've already got a kid on the way. And none of this shit even matters to you. And I envy you. I envy your limited view on things because you don't care about any of the other stuff that's going on. And I'm actually saying you might be winning. But for those of

us that are out there on the hustle in our 20s and you're living in some of these bigger cities and everything's kind of a competition and these are your boys but you're kind of when they get really good news you're kind of more bummed out than you are excited for your friend because that's kind of the part that you don't like to admit but a lot of you guys are doing it i probably have done it i know a bunch of my friends have done it to me being like what fucking rossillo's killing it really that's awesome um so it's like it's forever but uh you know just just make sure you're not like talking up stocks like just don't be like stock guy to everybody like hey you know that reminds you of this sick move i made on dell right and i think you already did it by that email

like i kind of feel like you know what I feel like you kind of nailed that already. Okay. Okay, this one's bad. All right. Our man checks in, 26 years old from Philly. He's living at home now because he's working remotely. Joined the club. All right.

Went out with my sister and her friends all in their 20s. Last Saturday, started drinking beer around three in the afternoon, having a great time. Fast forward several hours. Uh-oh. We moved to our friend's house and I got a little over my skis. I eventually got into an argument with one of my sister's friends and called her a very bad word. We're not going to repeat here. This is pretty much the one you can never come back from. I woke up having remembered absolutely none of it, went downstairs and my entire family would not speak to me. I think getting that wrecked at your family's house in your twenties is a whole, um,

I mean, look, I do not have a family that gets after him on the holidays. So I can't even fathom what it would be like to be like home and it'd be in my twenties. And like, I don't know. And like,

Hey everybody, I'm going to throw in some radio head. Um, so anyway, he went downstairs, family wouldn't talk to him. Kyle, when you go home, do you, I'm sure you get after it. Like, look, when I would go home for the holidays, I would go out, but I wouldn't rage all day and then show back up to my parents.

Maybe in the summer. If I'm doing the Thanksgiving night thing, I'm sneaking into the basement. I'll see y'all in the morning. Yeah, right. I'll see you guys. I'm like a happy drunk anyway, though. I'm not in danger of doing any anything that's gonna like sever relationships but i've had a few hungover thanksgivings where i think my family on purpose my father just

messed with me they we always had the earliest thanksgiving ever and you know thanksgiving we all know the deal i mean some of you don't most of us do that wednesdays like the all-timer and when you're younger especially when you're coming back from college, you think you're so cool. And you're just like, yeah, I'm back. I'm awesome now. Did you see my hoodie from Vermont? Yeah. All right.

So he goes, wakes up, remembers none of it. He goes, I knew in my head instantly I must have got in an argument with my sister's friend because she was baiting me the entire night giving me sass remarks after jokes i made eventually saying that guys like me are pigs and the last words i remember her saying to me was i bet you would like to fight me all right that's not very nice um to provide some context on my sister's friend she is um very social activist kind of that newer thing we're seeing all right so she constantly posts on instagram stories about how woke she is. She gets in political arguments with anyone she possibly can. If you've not met this type of person yet, God bless you. After hearing about what I did, I knew my sister's friend had gotten to me to eat the cheese and the mousetrap went slamming down on my neck.

Very good analogy. I know I was completely wrong for calling a woman that word, especially one of my sister's friends. Okay. Yes, you were. I am completely embarrassed to wish that I'd practiced some self-control. Sunday night, my mom expressed her disdain for me and told me that I needed to reevaluate my life. Both my sisters have not spoken to me. I'm very upset because my sisters and I

are all extremely close and enjoy going out together. In addition, my family has been upset with me because the only time I ever go over the top drunk is when I'm at home. So wait,

you only get this banged up when you're home? And the rest of the time, you're fine? That rest of the time you're fine. That's insane. I know, like, again, you want to be delicate. Everyone is different here,

but I don't know. Stop blacking out at your parents' house. This is the third time this year I've completely destroyed a potentially very fun night. Humiliating and sucks. Yeah, you're bummed out. I don't know.

So when you sent this email, that've completely destroyed a potentially very fun night. It's humiliating and sucks. Yeah, you're bummed out. I don't know. So when you sent this email, that meant you sent it so he was a week out. He was a week out. I would think at 26 the hangover would have gone away, but now you're having the mental apology tour hangover, which is going to give you a lot worse in two more years. Just

so you know, once that 27, 28 year old thing, science kicks in and you're going to be bummed out for like a couple weeks. So so you know, once that 27, 28 year old thing, science kicks in and you're going to be bummed out for like a couple of weeks. So hopefully you're over it. Hopefully you're over it by now reading some of this email. Okay. All right. It's because I'm going to always operate with like, well, I don't know. I don't want to make any assumptions here. All right. So both of his sisters have not spoken to him. I'm very upset. Serving close to where he said that. It's humiliating. It sucks. Yep. But it never happens when it's with my friends. And my sisters have emphasized

that heavily to my mom and dad. All right. So the sisters have his back here saying, hey, actually, he's never liked this except when he comes home. My issue is that I don't want to apologize to my sister's friend.

I do not have any respect for her. I do not want to give her the satisfaction after the way she acted. Am I completely in the wrong? I know that I'm partially am. Should I also give up entirely on going out in my hometown? It sounds like if this happens

every time you're out in your hometown, but I think you could, if you're not this, if it's not this big of an issue the rest of the time, like, you know, there, there are ways to figure this thing out, you know, every now and then, like, if you know, it's going to be a long night, you can, you can, uh, you can go, Hey, I'm just going to drink soda waters with lemon and not tell anybody, you know, and I'll, I'll clock it out. I mean, I know that sounds a little weird. You'd have to go through all that kind of stuff to avoid it, but you know what I'm just going to drink soda waters with lemon and not tell anybody. And I'll clock it out. I mean, I know that sounds a little weird. You'd have to go through all that kind of stuff to avoid it.

But you know what I'm saying here. There are ways around this. And if you're that fine the rest of the time, then I don't know what's going on when you're home here. All right. I think the key thing is the apology. You don't want to apologize to the girl. You call her a really bad word, man.

And you cannot mean the apology and apologize if that fixes some things. Here's the deal. It's your sisters. And you said you're close. You guys are going to be friends again. This is not going to be a thing that now changes the course of your friendship with your sisters forever. They're your sisters. They're stuck with you and you're stuck with them.

So don't freak out about the long-term thing here with the sister. I think what you do is you explain it and be like, hey, look, I screwed up, but not unprovoked. the sister. I think what you do is you explain it and be like, Hey, look, I screwed up, but not unprovoked. And if you want me to apologize to her, I will, even though I don't want to. So maybe that helps repair some of this stuff. It's expedites the situation with the sisters. Um, but you should, you should want to apologize just to make your mom a little happier and like whatever. But now, you know, the deal, it's like you have two strikes on you at home. And if this happens again, like when your parents start saying, like, re-evaluate your

shit, that's the worst. It sucks. My thing was my parents would be down on me. And then as soon as I was successful, it didn't matter. Then they were like, oh, hey, you're back for the weekend? You're going to hang out with your buddies? I was like, yeah. Yeah, I am.

I'm 28 now. They're like, oh. When I came back and I was like 25, 26, they're like, oh, you're going to go out the whole weekend? I'm like, yeah, I'm 28 now. You're like, oh, when I came back and I was like 25, 26, like, oh, you're going to go out the whole weekend? Like, yeah, I'm here visiting. Like, really? I'm like, you know, you guys are acting like this isn't normal for a 25 year old. But again, you know, everyone's parents are different.

So this is repairable. It's not the end of the world. Don't act like it is. I know it feels like it in the moment, but I would say if you're going to get super after after it um try to time it out so it's not when you're with your parents and sisters all the time what would you do in that case kyle if i was him i think you just take one for the team you could specifically apologize for saying what i imagine is the c word and um i don't know move on yeah do it for your sisters you don't have to feel sorry you know just say sorry it's easy yeah i mean i don't know that i want to make a pattern of endorsing hey just apologize and don't

mean it um but i mean she was really saying all these terrible things to you i can imagine the buttons that were being pushed for a drunk guy i mean it's some of it's a little understandable but definitely not and with all of these emails I'll imagine there's sometimes people don't want to come clean on everything. But this guy admitted a lot of stuff he's not psyched about. So let's take him at his word. She was, you know, he can't do what he did. But I also don't think people should get a pass on doing their whole thing, you know. And for her to say, I bet you'd like to fight me.

Like, what does, what does that mean? So, uh, let's just leave it at this. Just stop blacking out at your parents' house.

All right. Problem solved. Okay. That's one to grow on. I hope you enjoyed the podcast this week. We have an awesome schedule

next week. So again, we'll talk to you next week thanks everybody Thank you.